Make Malahide a better place to live

A number of classes from our school had the distinction of working on a very exciting project led by Fingal County Council. The County Council was looking for new, fresh ideas on how to improve Malahide and felt that children had many of the best ideas and their voices needed to be heard and their ideas explored.

The classes looked at different aspects of Malahide which included Destination, Streetscape and Movement. Each class visited Malahide Library where officials from Fingal County Council held a workshop to allow the children to explore various themes, come up with ideas and give their feedback. Based on this workshop the children went on to discuss, brainstorm and create their designs for Malahide in the future, through drawing, painting, construction and creative writing. Fingal County Council provided support throughout the project with regular visits to the classrooms. A number of fantastic projects were chosen to represent the ideas the children had come up with. These projects were first displayed in Malahide Library for the public to see and give feedback

As a conclusion to the project a selection of children were chosen to represent the school at the Council Chamber in Swords on Wednesday 19th June to present their ideas to the County Council and to the Mayor. It was an incredible day for everyone. We had the opportunity to meet the other schools who participated in similar projects and to view their ideas also. Each school presented its projects and explained where and how their ideas came about.

As always the children were on their best behaviour and were a credit to the school and the teachers present were bursting with pride as they watched the children take to the podium to present their ideas to the County Council. The County Council were so impressed with the ideas of our school which included cycles lanes and cycle rental throughout Malahide, themed bins around the village, a skate park, a new layout for the Marina, a boardwalk along the coast and a pedestrianised New Street to name a few. These are all very realistic ideas that we hope the Council will implement in the future. We are excited at the prospect of continuing this relationship with Fingal County Council so that each year the children can provide new ideas to make our community a better place to live. We would like to thank all the children who participated in the project, their views and opinions will help improve our beautiful town. Our thanks also to the class teachers involved and to Ms Dignam and Mr Lynch who co-ordinated the project.